Robyn Rowland and her father, Warrigal founder Norm. Photos: Supplied.
When Robyn Rowland moved in to care for her 100-year-old father, Norm, she never expected the experience would inspire a deeply moving poetry collection.
But Steep Curve captures their journey as a testament to caregiving, ageing, and the strength of family bonds.
The book covers the two-and-a-half-year period when Robyn moved in with Norm to be his companion and caregiver.
Norm Rowland OAM is known in the Illawarra for being the founder of Warrigal and for living until 102, while Robyn has published 12 poetry books, many anchored in historic events, such as The Intimate War Gallipoli.
However, this one was deeply personal with a story that began in 1990 when her mother passed away.
“Dad and I had a close relationship after that. We were on a daily communication basis with Skype because I was living overseas quite a bit in Ireland and Turkey,” she said.
But halfway through 2019, Robyn felt a pull to return home and be with her aging father.
“I just felt like I needed to come back,” she said.
“After I arrived, Dad said he was going to have a pacemaker put in, and so he would have been about a month off turning 100.”
Age and operations didn’t hold him back though, as he happily celebrated his centenary with birthday parties hosted by Warrigal, Kiama Bowling Club and by family.
“So initially it was companionship, but then COVID came in quite soon after that,” she said of transitioning into being his carer.
“So in an ironic way, it served us, really.”
Their relationship grew through physical and emotional challenges, frustration, anger, grief, love and care, prompting the seasoned poet to find solace in her writing, initially keeping a diary to document her experiences.
Over time, those diary entries evolved into the poems that now make up Steep Curve.
Weaving through what was a loving relationship but with sometimes difficult experience, the book navigated the complexities of caring for her 100-year-old father in the house he built 65 years before.
“It’s only afterwards that you have time and a clear mind to craft it, edit it and choose what you want to say,” she said.
“Poetry can capture emotion and experience in a way other writing can’t, and it’s so precise and descriptive, while this book is also a narrative, it’s telling a story.”
Robyn with her book Steep Curve, written about her time with father, Norm.
Heartbreaking and tender, it not only chronicles Robyn’s time with Norm during COVID but also weaves in poems she had written for him years earlier and after his passing, creating a tapestry of their lifelong relationship.
“He really was an impressive person and that does come out in the book at times,” she said.
Norm was born to immigrant parents and had a working-class upbringing, but managed to gain a spot in a selective Parramatta school, before being pulled out at age 15 by his father to start a fitter and turner apprenticeship.
Through sheer determination and 12 years at night school, he rose to become the superintendent of Tallawarra Power Station at Yallah and invented pollution-reducing fabric filters for power stacks.
However, it was founding the Warrigal aged care home in 1967-68 to address the lack of aged care services in the region that many know him for.
“He was president of the Lions Club when he realised there was no aged care between Wollongong and the Victorian border,” she said.
“It’s hard to believe now.
“So they began with a 12-bed nursing home up on Mount Warrigal.”
But Steep Curve is not just a tribute to Norm; it is also a poignant exploration of the complexities, challenges and rewards of ageing and caregiving.
Despite Norm being blessed as strong and healthy, recommending “a wise choice of parents and a whiskey a day” for a long life, Robyn said the role of carer wasn’t easy.
She acknowledges that not everyone may be able to undertake such a role, but that she was able to get through thanks to support systems like Carers Gateway and the very one he started, Warrigal.
Warrigal CEO Jenni Hutchins said Robyn’s experiences as a daughter and carer for her father through the book were ones many could relate to.
“Norm’s efforts to create meaningful support for older people has had an immeasurable impact on our local community, and his legacy continues to live on through our Warrigal vision – a world where older people feel known, loved and connected,” Jenni said.
Steep Curve is available via Five Islands Press.
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